VINTAGE PICS
by Robin

I thought it would be fun to travel down memory lane while the seas are still over 5 ft and snow is covering the entire Northern East Coast. It helps me to fight the "homesickness" for the sea by looking at these adorable pictures of the day when our, then 8 yr old, son outfished his Mom & Dad.

After Hurricane Francis destroyed our county and then H. Jeanne continued along the same path in 2004, we needed a day out on the water. The beautiful Jetty Park pier was closed because it was structurally unsound. Most people were still in recovery mode. I can't even remember if we had power back on, but we went fishing.



Jack picked up a tripletail off the beaches and then we moved in by the pier to see what we could find. Little man & I scored big. He scored bigger!

We both got 5 lb Black drums.



We both got sheepshead. (Look at that cute smile. "Look Mom, the fish weighs a lot!")




Then, he scored a Triple Header with a legal Red Fish.



That was such an amazing family day on the water.
(That was our old boat too!)

Happy Fishing, if you can get out.

MAHI COLOR CHANGE
by Robin

I was reminiscing last night some favorite pictures from back in 2008. This was the day I (with Jack's help) caught my 61 lb cobia. It was as tall as I was. Jack caught a Warsaw grouper about 25-30 lbs, too. What a day!!



But then I looked at the 16 lb mahi which we had caught first. It was overshadowed at the time by our personal best cobia.

But.... look. Here he is when being first landed in the boat. I've always read about mahi camoflague, but didn't realize I had caught it on "film" myself. This fish is silver/blue.



Here it is backed up so you can see these are back to back photos.



Look at this fish..... he's going blue to green.


And here he is in the 4th picture - a beautiful light green/yellow.


Can you believe that? How did I miss this?

Very cool!!

Happy Fishing!

BOLDWATER TV PICS
by Robin


I found these today online. I love them both for totally different reasons.

I am truly in fishing withdrawls. I don't think we've ever gone this long without fishing since owning our boat. I'm highly anticipating clean blue water, mahi spotting & fishing and much warmer days ahead. I don't think I could ever live landlocked ever again. The ocean is in my blood and it will stay with me forever.



Then, this one........ it makes me laugh. Jack has a favorite song where the lyrics start with, "If you ain't been aground, then you, ain't been around. Just pray to God the high-tide will set you free." Yep. This is the poster-child for that song.



How much longer must I wait.........

(Part of me really hates this strict schedule that I've gotten myself into with teaching a class at the co-op. Sigh.)

Happy Fishing!

AGENDAS & POLICY & FISHING
by Robin

I was doing some research for a blog post that I intend to put up in the next day or so. I'm gathering info & images to defend something I heard at the baith shop down by the port. Anyhow, what I found was something entirely different but shockly interesting none-the-less.

Don't tell me there is no agenda to shut down fishing!!!

In This National Geographic article, written in 2002, it summarizes how declassified military technology was now being used to help fishermen find the best sea beds to drop their nets and essentially rape the ocean of all the fish. Beyond ocean floor maps, NOAA (weather) was releasing daily faxes to sword fleets to help them find the fish. (In truth, they're available for anybody to view online, not just to sword fishermen.)

Anyhow, a study was done by the Pew Charitable Trusts (remember that name), focusing on the North Atlantic Ocean. Interesting, because last time I read up on some of my snapper-debate links, PEW CHARITABLE TRUSTS (read here) was also responsible for the research & arguments for shutting down South Atlantic Red Snapper fishing.

PEW claims "The researchers found that quantity of fish hauled from the North Atlantic has doubled since the 1950s and increased eight-fold from levels harvested at the turn of the last century.
The result has been the collapse of fisheries in the North Atlantic and around the world—fish stocks in the Northern Atlantic are only one third of what they were in 1950 and one sixth what they were in 1900.

And this decline is accelerating, said Daniel Pauly, who led the study." (Listen here to the Perils of Overfishing by Mr. Pauly )

(SIMILAR Red Snapper argument: "The rule is supposed to be a stopgap while government agencies consider setting more sweeping, long-term restrictions in response to government research that estimates the stock of red snapper in the Southeast is just 3 percent of what it was in the 1950s." )

Pew goes on to say about the North Atlantic.....

"We need to reduce fishing pressure and fleet sizes and have broader protections for habitats and ecosystems. No-take zones are the best, but the hardest to achieve politically, he said.
(South Atlantic's Red Snapper similar version ) Certain fishing areas in the North Atlantic should be tightly restricted, and catch quotas should all be implemented, added Rosenberg.
We need to close at least 30 percent of the North Atlantic Ocean to fishing, said Pauly. Without such measures we will lose all our fisheries. "


Ok folks, take a deep breath and clear your mind a second. They make it sound much like "The Sky is Falling" scenario, much like we heard from Congress about bailouts, takeovers, and rescues. I also couldn't help but notice that the sky was always falling from the liberal media's "sky". They've got one professor and a highly funded Trust to defend their point, meanwhile, we've got hundreds to thousands of fishermen that argue the point on many of these species. Yet, we keep getting our fishing grounds shut down. Why is that??

As Beck would say, blood is shooting out of my eyeballs from reading all these lies or twisted truths, at best. What can you do about it?

MARCH ON WASHINGTON

"United We Fish" to seek Congressional Support

on February 24, 2010.

Read Here for more details.

MAHI FRY
by Robin

Every so often, we have to discover a new way to fix fish to make it exciting to eat again. Jack has a recipe that we all fell in love with. One day, for lunch, our eldest decided he wanted to see if he could recreate Daddy's recipe. He came very close.



I really love it that my kids enjoy the kitchen as much as we do. We have a great time cooking together. I believe his secret ingredients are Italian bread crumbs, garlic salt or powder, salt, pepper, maybe old bay and some chili powder is option if you like a little kick. Use egg as a binder before you coat w/ seasonings.


Then, he let those sit while we worked on some black-eyed peas. You can see my secret ingredient. I know it doesn't make sense, but I really like these spices to give the beans the right flavor.


Then, my son fries in about 1/2" of EVOO or Veggie oil. Make sure you don't overcook the fish.



Look for that perfect golden outside with white flakes on the inside.


Stir your beans frequently. We also have a pot of rice, because that is standard at our house.



So, now you see our school lunch menu and who serves it. LOL. We love homeschooling by the sea.

Happy Fishing!! We have friends that were going trolling today since it is such a beautiful day.
Robin

I'm alive!! Really, really I am.

I've got another month of being so full with kid competitions and then life will begin to wind down from schooling demands and change over to fishing. We look forward to migrating cobia, mahi and maybe even tuna.

Oh, how we all look forward to those warm months of being on the boat, scouting for pelagics.

For now, we'll probably continue saving money for that time and eat the frozen bags of fish that we already have in the deep freeze. My eldest cooked a bag of mahi from May 30th, yesterday for lunch. I took pictures and will do my best to post them up soon. He's carrying on the tradition of cooking like his father. Not to say I don't cook, but Jack is king of seafood & fish seasoning, grilling, frying, steaming, etc.

Tomorrow is going to be an excellent day for fishing but we're heading out for Lego League Regionals with our son & other engineers-to-be. Maybe next weekend.

Happy Fishing!

SEA TURTLES AFFECTED BY THE COLD
by Robin


http://www.nasa.gov/centers/kennedy/news/seaturtles.html

"Massive rescue efforts on the north end of the spaceport, a few miles away from Launch Complex 39, "The Shop" at the Merritt Island National Wildlife Refuge has been transformed from a garage to a sea-turtle rescue facility. Inside, dozens of federally protected turtles -- mostly green sea turtles, along with the occasional loggerhead -- are warming up in plastic pools and on tarps spread across the floor."

Edited to Add: Young Manatee Found Wedged in Rocks. If you see the video, I've been at those docks before!!

http://www.wftv.com/countybycounty/22216574/detail.html

OUR ANNIVERSARY DINNER
by Robin

We decided that we would use some of the snapper meat to celebrate our 17th anniversary dinner. That is all Snapper shoulder steak babe!!


That was way too much meat for me, so I opted for the 2nd cut off the shoulder. (Actually, it ended up being too much meat for Jack as well.)



Lots of veggies, cornbread and vegan butter.

WORMS
by Robin

Amberjack, especially the big ones, are riddled with worms. We had to cut out chunks of meat from the amberjack steaks. I hated that but nobody wants to get a mouth full of that.

LOTS OF MEAT!!
by Robin

Jack and I are conservationist at heart. We love God's creation of wildlife on land or in the sea. I was an animal science major in college and have always loved animals. But one thing we keep in perspective is that some animals are made for food.



We made a decision early in our first years of offshore fishing never to take more than what we could eat/freeze. We wouldn't take animals that were inedible, simply for trophies. We tried 2 sharks, but felt so guilty that we vowed never to do that again. Sharks are beautiful top predators in the oceanic food chain, to be appreciated. To this day, I cannot choke down a shark steak to save my life.



BUT, we have no problem with filling the deep freeze for a few months at a time.



As I have mentioned, to the point of exhaustion, Red Snapper species are being taken from our dinner plates unnecessarily. There is no shortage. But, we will comply with the rulings begrudgingly. Thursday, was the last day for Jack to take some Red Snapper for an indefinite time.



We carefully, filleted the fish & filled the big bowls up with meat.



It was a sight to behold. Not for beauty, but because it may be the last time we get to freeze up Snapper steaks. What can I say? We're sentimental folks.



I took extra care in vacuum-packing the meat. This machine has more than paid for itself!




Here is the side of the big snapper. Look at those thick shoulder steaks. They will be saved for special occasions.



One thing I want to point out is in the side pictured... there is a blood spot in the center of the steak. Somebody (not Jack) was not careful in how they handled the fish and they bruised the meat. I'm not real happy about that.

More tomorrow.......

12.31.09 - NYE Snapper Fishing
by Robin

First off, my apologies for being a week delayed in posting up Jack's beautiful fish. It was a busy start to our new year and we even got started back up with homeschooling again. I must say, I'm feeling much better in the new year.

So today, I had time to work on uploading, downsizing and uploading again to the blog. I have plenty of pictures that I will space out over the rest of the week as to not overburden you all.

Where to begin???

I guess I'll start off with the crew. Three J's and 1 B (names) headed offshore about 5:30 am from Port Canaveral. They were greeted by some serious 4-5 ft seas. Thankfully, none of them were proned to sea-sickness. These are some hard-core fishermen & woman.



Jack said that the day started off slow. They were targeting grouper before the season closed at midnight. What they kept finding was Red Snapper, which are suppose to be on the verge of extinction. Sheesh.... if I had permission, I'd post up all the pics of fishermen with their limit of Red Snapper that day. Tons of them....... almost a seaworthy infestation of the red buggers.

Here is one of the J's with his snapper. This one is slightly lighter in color, which is normal. Same species.



Finally Jack got his Red Snapper. This one ended up being the biggest of the day. Ignore the fingers in the eyeballs. Offshore fishermen do not put their hands in fish mouths or gills like bass fishermen. Gill plates are razor sharp & their mouths are full of teeth. This is the safest way for Jack to handle a keepable fish. Keepable? Is that a word?




Then, Jack was fishing off the bottom when an Amberjack gave him the fight of a lifetime. They aren't called Reef Donkeys for nothing. They're stubborn as can be, and strong!!




Eventually, Jack won the battle and got him into the boat.



And into the floor fish cooler. I really wish we had one of these built into our boat floor. It is so much easier to slide fish into that then to place one in an upstanding version.



Mr. Amberjack was so big, he couldn't even fit in our smaller cooler. Everybody caught their limit (2) of Red Snapper. Jack's are under ice.



Most these pictures were provided by J & B. Thanks.

Stay tuned in for tomorrow's driveway pics.

GIANT BLUEFIN TUNA

http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,581966,00.html?test=latestnews

Before you know it, SAFMC will close down tuna fishing too.

OFFSHORE - Hunt for Red Snapper
by Robin

Jack and friends are offshore today, searching deep waters for red snapper. He's not on our boat, but on a friend's. John is an awesome bottom fishermen and he always puts Jack on big fish. One of the other guys also has great locations for bringing home his limit of reds. So between the three guys & 1 wife, they should do well.

It has also been posted that mahi have been spotted 180' depths and cobia closer inshore.

I did not send him w/ the camera, so I will take a pic of whatever makes it to the cooler.

Saying prayers for safe journies & lots of fish.

CLOSED
by Robin

Much like a lot of the bottom fishing in our area, my blog is undergoing regulations, limits & closures. I hope I did not forgot to invite any friends or family.

It was my hope & dream to provide valuable information to other local fishing friends while entertain family & friends with photography of the sea. What has happened is a much different story.

For those unaware of our situation, in October, we received a knock on the door from NOAA-NMFS (Nat'l Marine Fishery Serv) field agents who had been watching my blog for months! It seems that we broke the law, admittedly, by being within 500 yds of a N. Right Whale back in March. Somebody photographed us (& another boat) from the beach, but also, they managed to find my blog and copy my photographs & use my testimony to build a file against us.

We were let off with a warning. The fine is in the tens of thousands. God protected us through that rather quick trial, as I believe He knew in our hearts ut was only to be in awe of such a magestic creature and never to harm it. We had no intentions of drifting so close to Mama & calf. I still believe she was just as curious of us, coming over to us.

Regardless, my sitemeter tells me that folks from all around the world are coming to view my images that have been taken without permission and put onto a google image site. I'm getting rather tired of that too. Once, I was linked to and by CNN for my opinion on the woman who was killed by an airborn stingray down in the keys. Nothing ever came of that, but it kinda freaked me out.

So, with that said, I have decided to close my blog to only people I give permission to view. It's so sad that we live in these times, but that's the way it is.

MONDAY
by Robin


It was in the 60's with some building winds on Monday. But, the sun was out and we wanted to dunk the boat to keep her running smoothly.

We didn't leave the port 'til noon. Waves were rolling over long periods, but the worst part was the wind wave.



We tried to troll for kingfish but before we could get started, the seagulls were all over our live baits. That did not go well. Trolled a short while, gave up because of the wind and headed to the beach for wind-protected waters.

Caught some small whiting, which we threw back. I sent a live bait down and it manage to survive a long time w/ no attacks so he was released when we were done fishing.

Came in and threw some shrimp to the pelicans in order to catch these photos.



Tomorrow, Jack and a bunch of coworkers are heading offshore for some deep-water dropping. They want to come back with some nice red snappers. I am unable to fish right now until a couple body parts get stronger. Snapper fishing closes in a few days. Inshore snapper/grouper fishing closes on Friday.

I think that pretty much leaves us pompano, flounder, kingfish for the rest of winter until the cobia show up in big numbers in March.

Happy Fishing.

WHITING
by Robin


These are from the Monday before Christmas. I kept meaning to post them up, but kept forgetting. They're not really memorable. Two small fish.

But then again, Jesus fed a multitude with two small fish and five loaves of bread. If those little guys could make it into the Bible, I guess mine can make it to the blog.

MERRY CHRISTMAS Everyone!!
by Robin

Checked some weather reports and had lots of free time today, so the kids and I headed to the beach.



Ok....... stop that. Just get IT out of your mind. It was NOT HOT.

55 deg with some wind.

BUT, I will saw the water was much warmer than the air. I did not mind putting my feet/legs in it to cast out.

When the sun disappeared behind bizarre clouds, it was downright cool.



I brought 2 poles although only 1 was used. Here is a self-portrait of me surf fishing.



I only caught 2 little fish right after arriving there about 8:30 am. One was a whiting and the other a Crevelle Jack which looks very similar to the Pompano, which I was seeking.



As the sun went up, the waves were building,



tide was coming in,



which would have been a good thing.



However, my holiday truffles, filled with evil dairy, decided to attack my body and my joints started swelling hour by hour. I've never felt an attack come on so quickly.



So, by 11 am, we were back in the car, heading home. The kids were happy. They had done what they set out to do. (Dig a huge pit and sit in it.) They were getting some fast food fries. And I was headed to my recliner with half a muscle relaxer & an anti-inflammatory. Whew....... that was a close call.

I hate taking medicine, but am so thankful it is there for when I really need it. I'm already able to stand up a couple hrs later with minimal pain.

We're watching the weather for some New Year's Eve fishing. Pretty soon, the bottom fishing will be closed down and so Jack is gathering a crew together. I'd like to go too, but we have to see how I'm doing in a few days.

Happy Fishing!!

SURF FISHING
by Robin

We only caught 4 whiting, 2 thrown back to grow up more. Still, it made a nice dinner last night for the guys.

Canaveral National Seashore. Those waves are suppose to be 1-2 ft high. NOT! I love the mist rolling off the top of the wave below.





Here's a self-portrait of myself. I didn't want to scare anybody with a jumbo size photo of me with barely any make-up.



Here's why the fishermen go here for the pompano. See the steepness of this beach? Practically a 30- 45 deg angle. This makes for a nice deep drop-off in the water and lots of bigger fish come in to feed. I really wanted to be back out there today, but it will have to wait since I have some last minute Christmas shopping to do.



I have pictures of the fish, but they're still on the camera. It is rather insignificant when you compare 2 whiting with the big mahi that we've caught.

Merry Christmas!! I may not blog again for the next few/several days.